SAN MARCOS  Twenty-eight years after inspiring the title character in Greg Evans’ long-running comic strip “Luann,” the San Marcos cartoonist’s daughter, Karen, is working by her father’s side as the strip’s co-author.

Although he has no immediate plans to retire, the 65-year-old Evans says he takes great comfort in knowing that Luann — a dreamy, overdramatic high school senior — will carry on without him one day in very safe hands.

“I grew up with these characters,” said Karen Evans, a 34-year-old San Marcos resident whose day job is dean of students at Magnolia Science Academy, a charter middle school in La Mesa. “When I think of Luann and Brad and the others, they are like family members who I have known my entire life.”

Detail view of “Luann” cartoonist Greg Evans working in his studio in his San Marcos home. He uses Adobe Photoshop on a McIntosh computer to draw the comic.

Detail view of “Luann” cartoonist Greg Evans working in his studio in his San Marcos home. He uses Adobe Photoshop on a McIntosh computer to draw the comic.

Evans said he always dreamed of being a cartoonist, but couldn’t find a buyer for his hand-drawn strips in his 20s and early 30s, so he bounced around in a series of jobs — high school art teacher in El Centro, TV news camera operator in Colorado Springs and talking-robot operator at the San Diego Zoo and Seaport Village. Then one day in 1984, he saw 5-year-old Karen, the youngest of his three children with wife, Betty, walking around their Twin Oaks Valley home dressed in her mom’s clothing and jewelry.

“I saw her and I got the idea for a strip about a little girl, and for once it struck a chord because it wasn’t a contrived subject. It was drawn from real life,” said Evans, who decided to name the character “Luann” and aged her to 13, because teen angst would provide more fodder for storylines. On March 17, 1985, “Luann” launched and is still going strong. The syndicated strip now appears in 450 newspapers and websites

(gocomics.com), and it is read by more than 600,000 online visitors each week. In 2003, Evans won the industry’s highest accolade, the National Cartoonist Society’s Reuben Award for Outstanding Cartoonist of the Year. And in 2006, Evans premiered a musical based on the strip, “Luann: Scenes in a Teen’s Life.”

In the early years of “Luann,” Evans said he drew plot ideas from teen magazines and, later, Karen’s own experiences getting her ears pierced, wearing braces and entering high school. Betty served as a constant sounding board for plot and character ideas, and Karen said she would occasionally see names of friends and funny stories from the dinner table end up in her father’s strip.

Portrait of "Luann" cartoonist Greg Evans and his daughter Karen Evans in Greg's studio at his San Marcos home.
— Charlie Neuman

Portrait of "Luann" cartoonist Greg Evans and his daughter Karen Evans in Greg's studio at his San Marcos home.
— Charlie Neuman

But Evans said he was always careful to give Luann and her cartoon family — goofy older brother, Brad, and parents, Frank and Nancy DeGroot — lives of their own.

Twelve years ago, Luann matured to the age of 16, and this year, she entered her senior year of high school and got her first steady boyfriend. Meanwhile, Brad became a fireman and, after a long, stormy courtship, is now engaged to fellow firefighter, Toni Daytona.

For several years, Evans said he had wondered what would happen to “Luann” when he eventually retires. He considered ending the strip as Charles M. Schulz did with “Peanuts,” or contracting an illustrator/writer to take over. He also considered having his children carry on the legacy, but Karen said she and her siblings — sister Rhonda, 44, of Texas, and brother Gary, 37, of Ventura — didn’t inherit their father’s artistic talent.

“I can do some pretty good stick figures, but the artist gene skipped a generation in our family,” she said.

Then one day in June 2012, father and daughter hit on the idea of separating the writing and drawing of “Luann” and a partnership was born. Karen, who holds a degree in writing and literature, agreed to take an active hand in helping her father create the plots and character arcs in the story and he would carry on drawing the strip. On Sunday afternoons, they meet for story sessions, and, with Betty, they critique the drawn panels that Evans produces after each session.

Evans said he has found his wife and daughter’s input invaluable to both long-term planning and character development.

“Before it was always just me and now it’s three of us and two of them are women,” he said. “They bring a whole other layer of detail, subtlety and nuance to the project. Luann has a lot more meat on her bones and complexity than she did before.”

One recent plot development that Karen had a hand in was the return of Quill, Luann’s exchange student boyfriend. Greg said he’d sent Quill back to Australia last year because he (and some readers) were bored with the character. But Quill’s departure upset a multitude of fans who comment daily about the strip on Facebook and

gocomics.com. Karen said she liked the idea of Quill’s comeback because the relationship is a milestone for Luann.

“Luann has always been dramatic and overemotional about boys,” Karen said. “Because she’s a high school senior now, we feel like it’s time for her to start growing up and maturing, and having her first stable boyfriend is an important part of that process.”

"Luann" cartoonist Greg Evans and his daughter Karen Evans discuss the comic and her future involvement in its production at Greg's San Marcos home.
— Charlie Neuman

"Luann" cartoonist Greg Evans and his daughter Karen Evans discuss the comic and her future involvement in its production at Greg's San Marcos home.
— Charlie Neuman

Where he used to map stories out just a few weeks in advance, Evans said he and Karen are now doing story projections as far as a year ahead. They won’t divulge any future plot twists, though he said readers should prepare for “some drama and trauma” with Brad and Toni’s wedding. He also said they have to figure out how to transition the strip after Luann graduates from high school and heads for college.

“That might be an opportunity for us to retire some characters and introduce some new characters,” he said.

Evans is still happily drawing the strip each day on a computer in his home office, but one day he would like to turn the job over to another illustrator, hopefully another family member. Jonathan Upchurch, Evans’ 27-year-old grandson by daughter, Rhonda, said he is excited about the prospect of one day following in his grandfather’s footsteps.

“I’m definitely up for it,” said Upchurch, who now works for United Parcel Service in Irving, Texas.

But fans who worry about change or the loss of Evans’ signature jokes and style can rest at ease for now. The artist said he’s not going anywhere for a while.

“I still enjoy it and I look forward to it every day,” he said. “Until that changes, I’ll keep at it.”